Proficient on fiddle, acoustic and electric guitar, pedal steel and dobro, Bromberg attended Columbia University in the 1960s, studying musicology, playing Greenwich Village folk club gigs and knocking around with a number of noted musicians, including Tom Paxton, Tom Rush, Jerry Jeff Walker, and Richie Havens, as well as his hero Reverend Gary Davis, before moving on to session work and a series of solo recordings, first on Columbia, later on Fantasy and eventually on smaller independent labels.
A glance at the Appears on listing gives a fair indication of the extent of the session work, and with a fairly extensive touring schedule on top of the sessions it should come as no surprise to learn that, by 1980, he'd more or less had enough and cut back dramatically, playing the occasional session or live shows while he studied at the Kenneth Warren School of Violin Making in Chicago. He's been more active recently but devotes most of his time to David Bromberg Fine Violins in Wilmington, Delaware, where he and his wife made, repaired and dealt in quality instruments since 2002.